74 



THE CHICK BOOK 



these runs, commencing with the younger ones in the first, 

 which is five feet by ten feet, and as they grow 

 older, removing them to the large runs, which are 

 ten by ten feet. These flocks are unbroken until 

 they reach the colony houses, when they aim to keep 

 fifty in a house eight by eight feet. The chickens, how- 

 ever, have hatched so remarkably well this season that in 

 many cases they have been obliged to put over two hundred 

 in a pen, with seemingly no discomfort to the occupants. 



The method of feeding may be equally of iaterest to 

 many, as this also is quite a radical departure from established 

 methods. Here we find chicks started upon nothing but 

 hard grain until they reach the age of four days, when they 

 are given a dish of ground beef scraps, which is kept con- 



sorb all the beef scraps and cracked corn that their appetites 

 dictate is best for them, and with a supply of green cut 

 clover, of which the farm furnishes an abundance, they have 

 nothing to ask for in the way of food and care. That they 

 are improving under all these good things a visit to the 

 plant will convince the skeptical. 



Mr. Jordan buys nothing but the best of grain and beef 

 scraps, for the keen business foresight with which he man- 

 ages one of Boston's most successful coal handling estab- 

 lishments, has convinced him that it is not the cost of the 

 food or equipments that ruins the unsuccessful poultryman, 

 the mortality of the youngsters between the age of one and 

 four weeks being the cause assigned for nearly every case 

 where the "plant did not pay." 





-'-uJiJtiUk_ 



A Ptomising Flock In Front of One of the Brooding Houses on the Jordan Plant. 



stantly before them through the rest of their happy lives. 

 This way of providing food gives all an equal chance and 

 there is no possibility of there being any of the grain sour, 

 to cause bowel trouble and other ailments. The chicks are 

 given the run of a yard after thoy reach, the age of beven 

 •days, which yards are also kept pure by the growing of 

 green stuff between season^:. 



After they reach the age of six weeks, cracked corn is 

 added to their diet, and is kept always before them. This 

 ■system of feeding is, we think, the only one that couid be 

 carried out with such large flocks as we find on this plant. 

 Under the old system of mash feeding, the rush and scram- 

 ble for their share soon make it a case of the survival cf 

 the fittest, and the younger and weaker ones do not get 

 their proportion of the rations, so the gap between them 

 and their more successful brothers grows wider with each 

 day. Under this system each one has plenty of time to ab- 



The previous experience of the foreman, Mr. Young, 

 with poultry is represented practically by a cipher, he hav- 

 ing lived in the state of New Jersey on a large stock farm, 

 with no special liking for the poultry business, simply un- 

 dertaking it at Mr. Jordan's request, possibly until he could 

 a;et an experienced man. The success which came to him 

 from the first rapidly interested him in the business, and 

 at the present time he is fascinated with the business as the 

 rankest enthusiast of years' standing. 



There is a sanitarium in East Bridgewater for curing 

 consumptioin in the human family simply by makng the 

 patients sleep out of doors, or what amounts to that, winter 

 and summer, and why should not the chicken man adopt 

 for his feathered pets, who are much more creatures of the 

 air than the human family, similar methods? 



That Mr. Jordan's plant will be a success this season is 

 an assured fact, for at the present time the Boston market 



